It’s another crowded Friday night in Charlie O’Brien’s, a South Buffalo restaurant and pub. Proprietor Dino Pinelli emerges from a busy kitchen to serve two steaming hot dishes of his specialties, the Bleu Bacon Cheeseburger and Beef on Weck. Hungry patrons salivate over sandwiches made with produce grown on locally-owned farms in Ellicottville and drinks bottled at Flying Bison Brewery only a few miles away. Most of the meal didn’t travel more than 50 miles to reach their eager mouths. Landmarks like Charlie O’Brien’s give their host cities a unique cultural identity: a reason to visit and something for locals to be proud of. Before the age of national franchises and global supply chains, nearly every business was intimately tied to its community.
Recently, many cities have lost their identity to corporate intrusion. Each business is the same as those everywhere else, operating with only feigned regard for the health of the communities that they occupy. Their only measure of success is the amount of money extracted from each city, for these companies are distantly owned by thousands of faceless stockholders. Local wealth is exploited and squandered, and independent companies are supplanted by these corporations.
This disheartening effect of globalization is slowly manifesting itself everywhere, including Buffalo–although one wouldn’t know it from the sunny interior of Café 59, a locally-owned coffeehouse on Allen Street. In the heart of Allentown on a brisk October morning, scholar-cum-activist and Buffalo native Amy Kedron offers an intriguing case for adopting a local perspective.
In 2003 Kedron returned from graduate study in New York City to find the city in an economic crisis. “I noticed that the Elmwood strip started booming,” recounts Kedron. “Local businesses are in that area, and it preserves a lot of wealth, even in times of great need,” she explains. Kedron was inspired to create an organization for members of the community to rally behind–a publicity and advocacy campaign to preserve the economic and cultural wealth of the Buffalo area.
Buffalo First, founded by Kedron in 2006, describes itself as a network of local proprietors working towards three related goals: keeping business and money circulating in the Buffalo area, implementing environmentally sustainable business practices, and providing fair working conditions for employees. The organization’s constituency ranges from independent grocery stores and cafés to credit unions, professional services, and even coffee roasters and breweries.
Why does Buffalo’s diverse selection of local businesses need an advocacy organization? According to Kedron, “Our Main Street businesses have been struggling for decades, and the policies that have come from Washington have done very little to sustain those businesses.” She also points out that the Queen City is the third-poorest of its size in the country. University at Buffalo senior Brad Torchia, a business major and intern for Buffalo First, adds that “Buffalo definitely needs the attention.”
To participate in the campaign, businesses meeting the organization’s criteria can purchase a membership for 50 dollars. They receive a retail kit, which includes educational and promotional materials, including window posters and rights to use the Buffalo First logo in business publications. Members attend networking sessions and are also listed in Buffalo First’s local, independent business directory, enhancing visibility to the community.
Not all companies can become members, though. A local business is defined by Buffalo First as a privately-held firm whose ownership (or the majority of such) lives “within 50 miles of the main place of business” and is able to “make decisions about the business at all levels.” This excludes locally-run franchises of national chains.
A popular complaint about buying local is that locally-produced goods are usually sold at higher prices than those sold at national stores. Kedron claims that the popular perception of a price premium is often “an illusion” caused by large-scale advertising campaigns by national retail chains. Even when a price premium does exist, Kedron asks consumers to consider the “real impact” of their money, or how it is re-spent by the business. Jonathon Welch, local bookstore owner and member of Buffalo First’s board of directors, argues that “spending here means your money stays here, and therefore your money works for you doubly–it works to sustain your community.”
Kedron cites that “about three times more” of the money spent at local businesses, as opposed to a chain retailer, is re-spent in the area. Torchia explains that of every 100 dollars spent at a local book store, “about 45 dollars will stay in the local community.” The same amount spent at a national chain such as Borders will only re-circulate about 15 dollars. “We’re importing nearly everything,” adds boardmember Erin Cala. “We need to retool our economy here in Buffalo. I love this city, and I want to see the city thrive.”
“Buffalo has this huge problem,” continues Torchia. “College students graduate, then leave. In every city you’re seeing the same exact things. There’s a Barnes and Noble, a McDonalds–it hasn’t always been like that.” Torchia praises Buffalo First’s goal to reverse this trend by advocating local business growth. “It keeps people coming, and it also keeps people around.” Dino Pinelli offers similar encouragement. “Being a city blessed with hundreds upon hundreds of amazing places to go, why not keep your money in the area and see your neighbors succeed?”
As an enthusiastic supporter of Western New York’s economy, Pinelli owns Charlie O’Brien’s, an Irish pub and restaurant on Elk Street. Throughout its 13 years in operation, Charlie O’Brien’s has been a champion of supporting the local economy by purchasing its supplies exclusively from local vendors. “It definitely can be pricier,” cautions Pinelli, “but we love our area. We want to see the best it can be again.” Pinelli also offers a lot of praise for the network of entrepreneurs that Buffalo First has created. He recounts his first orientation with the organization, at which he met the owners of Johnnie Ryan Beverages. “We always want to promote local products,” continues Pinelli. He sells Johnnie Ryan soda “proudly, knowing it’s made in Western New York.” Pinelli even rewards regular customers with gift certificates that he purchases from Caz Coffee Café, another Buffalo First member.
Jim Park, owner of Mom and Pops Natural Foods since the summer of 2007, offers another perspective. Park feels that he can offer “a lot more direct, personal service” than a larger grocery chain, such as assisting customers with special orders. Park’s store, located on Main Street across from South Campus, even accepts campus cash from the university.
Jonathon Welch also had a lot to say about supporting Buffalo’s independent businesses. As the owner of Talking Leaves Books, Welch co-founded his business on Main Street in 1971 and has since expanded to a second location on Elmwood Avenue. “We’re rooted in this community,” Welch says with pride. “We grew out of it, so we give a lot back.” Welch warns that national booksellers and internet retailers “can’t really participate in every community because they don’t have the resources, and they don’t really have the interest either. Their participation in the community is further down the list, whereas for us it’s one of the most important things we do.” Welch’s biggest challenge has been remaining competitive and retaining his customer base since the intrusion of mega-bookstores and the advent of the internet. Welch considers Buffalo First a key initiative in educating consumers about the problems that these massive operations create for communities. “We’ve never linked together in a way that we can make a case,” continues Welch. “That’s much harder to do on our own.”
A parallel goal of the campaign is to educate consumers that commerce with locally-owned companies is also better for the environment. Kedron suggests that goods sold at national retail chains, especially those assembled from imported components, “might travel hundreds of thousands of miles” before arriving at the store, consuming large amounts of transportation fuel in the process. Torchia corroborates that the “average plate of food travels 1,500 miles” before consumption. Local, independent companies can establish local sources for many of their inputs, which Kedron posits as a “huge advantage” over national operations. “All businesses within Buffalo First,” explains Cala, “have made a commitment to ‘green’ their operational practices.” Cala is an environmental educator for the UB Green Office of University Facilities, and she was chosen for the board because of her knowledge of environmental issues. Cala submits that her “biggest contribution has been to focus on issues related to environmental sustainability and the environmental footprint associated with business practices.”
“When businesses become members,” Cala continues, “we help them identify areas where they can become ‘greener’.” Cala asks of each business, “instead of buying cleaning products from Wal-Mart or Sysco or from another national distribution company, could they use a local distributor? Are they able to retrofit or phase out anything that’s inefficient? Are they able to buy renewable power?” To help answer these questions, Buffalo First offers grant-funded “localization consulting” to help local businesses find nearby sources for their raw materials. “We quantify four impacts,” explains Kedron, including the amount of money diverted to the local economy and reduced shipping miles in the supply chain. “Often,” Cala explains with enthusiasm, “it just takes a simple phone call to switch to a different distributor.” Local businesses are in the best position to implement change, because they can quickly make decisions affecting their practices. Cala encourages consumers to support such businesses because their goods are “made of quality material, sourced in an environmentally responsible way.”
The organization is also a member of the Business Alliance for Local Living Economies (BALLE), a national support network for local business organizations. BALLE has put Buffalo First in contact with other non-profits such as Green Enterprise Toronto. “We’re all really open-source,” says Kedron regarding BALLE: “We don’t believe that we should keep our best practices to ourselves, because we’re all trying to help our neighborhoods grow.”
Of course, Buffalo First itself follows sustainable practices as much as possible. Kedron is a regular cyclist and enthusiastically advocates using public transit–Buffalo First’s office is less than a block from the Metro Rail Theater Station. Buffalo First also works to minimize the environmental impact of their campaign by using 100% recycled paper for all material distributed and screen-printing t-shirts with “the most conscientious local printer” available, T-Shirts With Love. Last November’s “Buy Buffalo Bash,” a festival with over 400 in attendance, was run as a “zero-waste” event. “After the whole night of tons of eating and drinking,” Kedron recounts, “we only threw out one small bag of garbage. Everything else was composted.”
Buffalo First is always seeking volunteers for its activities; Kedron values the contributions of students, who “understand these concepts and value them the most.” Torchia embodies this commitment, stating that “Cities like Boston and San Francisco” are “many years ahead of us.” He insists that “if people are educated and aware of the effects of shopping locally, that’s all you need to really make change.” Similarly, Pinelli considers it “essential to Buffalo’s growth to shop in your neighborhood and keep the local economy going.”
Kedron also urges every student to get off campus and explore what Buffalo has to offer. “UB can be a bit of an island,” she explains: “There are students that spend all four years on the campus and spend very little time in the city.”
Kedron invites readers to visit Buffalo First’s web site, buffalofirst.org.
